Ruthenium organometallic complexes incorporating R, R-chiraphos for nonlinear optical applications

Abstract

Organometallic complexes have proven to have significant nonlinear optical (NLO) properties. They possess great design flexibility; the metal, oxidation state, ligand environment and geometry can all be varied, they may be strong oxidizing or reducing agents, and they are often able to undergo facile NLO switching. Metal alkynyl complexes form an important group of organometallic complexes that have high potential in NLO material applications. The focus of the current study is to establish structure-property relationship for ruthenium alkynyl complexes incorporating chiral R,R-Chiraphos co-ligands, and to compare the behavior of these complexes to those of analogous complexes containing the archetypical co-ligand 1,2-bis(diphenylphosphino)ethane (dppe), one of the most widely-employed diphosphine ligands in this field. Chapter 1 presents an introduction to nonlinear optics and reviews organic, inorganic and organometallic compounds for which nonlinear optical responses have been measured. Chapter 2 covers the synthesis of linear ruthenium alkynyl complexes incorporating R,R-Chiraphos. Their crystal structures, electrochemical and spectroelectrochemical properties, circular dichroism responses, and linear and quadratic nonlinear optical properties are reported. Chapter 3 reports the synthesis of ruthenium alkynyl dendrimers incorporating R,R-Chiraphos. The crystal structures, electrochemical properties, linear optical properties and circular dichroism responses of selected examples have been carried out.